Piston #3 burning out?

Talking to one of the guys at work and he is hearing tails of number 3 piston burning in the newer diesels. Anyone heard of this or are his mechanic friends on drugs.
Have to admit I havent heard of it and cant remember seeing anything on here about it

^ Its probably the ZD30 story.

Early ZD's were prone for doing number 3 and 4 cylinder, those 2 cylinders got most of the hot EGR.

However, newer diesels run EGR cooler's to lower the temp's. But its best to just block that shit off.

2nd that on the zd30 diesel motors cracking 3+4 piston etc. As for the newer diesel I have heard nothing for the 2.5 common rails regarding pistons.

Think they are on drugs lol

Aussie Frontier said:

Talking to one of the guys at work and he is hearing tails of number 3 piston burning in the newer diesels.

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Or is he referring #3 in the very new V6 diesel?

No as far as I know its on the 4cyl oilers
When he told me I thought it could have been bad injectors etc leaning out that cylinder.
So pardon the ignorance but which models had the ZD30?

The ZD30 was in the earlier D22s, but I don't think the D22 ever suffered from the problem that the patrol did?

Yeah see thats what I mean noone on here has actually had a navara cook a piston

It does happen in the D22's.

No where near as common as the GU spec engine though.

2000-2001 ZD30's were the worst by far for doing it.

Happens to all manufactures. Toyota had the problem with the Aurion and Rav4 V6.

Dave said:

It does happen in the D22's

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Thanks for the clarification.

SimonK on here had it happen to his.

There's a few more guys, but I cant remember any other names.

Oh and Craig had it happen to his, but his was chipped.

This is my thoughts. If your gonna chip, lower temps as much as you can before hand.

Ie, bigger exhaust, upgraded intercooler. EGR's can keep temps down but shorten the life of the engine.

really need to find out exactly what motor they are referring to.
outside of the ZD30's, injector failure is the biggest cause of burnt out pistons.

There were issues with piston crowns melting, which is why they designed in a squirter that basically throws crankcase oil onto the underside of the piston as it's coming down in order to cool it.

As far as I know, every CRD engine has the oil squirter, it's essential in the D40s since they run hotter - more boost, more fuel = more temperature.

and probably every turbo diesel for the last 20 years has got the oil squirter's as well.

Nah, sorry Dave, mine just did a turbo which went through the motor, not a melted piston. In all my research at the time, I only came across 1 example of a melted piston. From my research turbo failure on the d22 was the most common failure. You are prob right in saying that the mechanics are just assuming all nissans use the zd30.

So in reality its more a Pootrol issue and they are just assuming its the Navara D22 as well. But it doesnt effect the D40

What Tweake said, there wouldn't be many diesels out there that dont have oil squirters.

Its more of a petrol thing. CA18DET have squirters, were NA's do not.

SR20's are the same from memory.

Simon, thats right. I knew your engine had seen better days.

The zd30 in my d22 shit itself a couple of months back. All the pistons cracked not just #3

I'd imagine this is a perfectly good reason why we should regularly check our oil levels.

Old.Tony said:

I'd imagine this is a perfectly good reason why we should regularly check our oil levels.

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Agree Tony but I believe that the ZD30 issue was much more than just inadequate oil supply. The first mod to the 2001 GU was, believe it or not, to fit a shorter dip stick so you had to fill the sump with more oil. This still didn't resolve what came to be known as the 'hand grenade problem'. Seems there was MAF and other issues including over boosting etc that continued for a couple of years......I believe that the new(er) common rail ZD30 has largely addressed the problems but there is still a degree of nervousness among the GU community and many are still fitting things like Dawes valves and EGT monitoring gauges, boost gauges just to be on the safe side. Frankly, my greatest fear after a second tank of diesel heavily contaminated with water....is that of fuel system destruction due to our crappy fuel storage practices in this country.

Early GU computers weren't advanced enough.

The computer couldn't keep up with how fast the turbo was spooling up.

The MAF is another problem. Nissan didn't program a fail safe in for it.